REVELATION: Book One of THE RECARN CHRONICLES (25 page)

“No signs of life from the
Pindar, sir. Anticipating departure of the soul at any
moment.”

The twenty or so people in
the room looked on anxiously. Even the less experienced among them
had been present for over a dozen such transfers. However, this was
the Pindar, the most powerful person in the whole Illuminati that
they had just witnessed die. The technician called out
again.

“The soul has left the body
and is heading towards the airlock.’

He paused for a
second.

“It’s in the airlock,
sealing donor pod now.”

Thomas’s soul had nowhere to
go now. Instinct was telling it to find another body but there was
only one direction available to it. The soul passed silently from
the airlock to the receiver capsule, where it found the peaceful
body of Marcus Gallagher 001. It hovered above the clone for a few
seconds and the technician quickly sealed the space between the
airlock and the receiver pod. The soul, invisible to the naked eye
but its presence confirmed by monitoring devices, dropped onto its
recipient and enveloped his entire body before seeping through the
pores of his body and heading into his brain.

“Soul in located within in
the clone. Injecting GHIH now.”

The correct dosage of growth
inhibitor hormone applied, all the team could do was
wait.

Two minutes later, the clone
opened its eyes. The team leader breathed a sigh of
relief.

“OK. Let’s take the lid off
the capsule guys. And let’s keep our fingers crossed.”

The lid was removed and
Marcus Gallagher 001 sat up. He looked around the room and saw one
of the female laboratory assistants admiring his naked body. He
winked at her.

“Don’t just stand there
looking girl. Find me some clothes. The Pindar has
returned.”

The mood in the great
boardroom was frosty, to say the least. Some of the Council of
Thirteen could see the commercial benefits of the cloning process
and wanted to further increase the Illuminati’s already
astronomical profits. Marcus did not.

Cavendish stood up and
rapped his ceremonial staff three times, hard on the ground,
signifying that he was about to speak.

“Can my Lord Pindar not see
that there is an incredible opportunity here? You, yourself, were
inhabiting a body that was – how shall I describe it – not fit for
purpose. You now occupy the body of a fit and healthy young man,
albeit that of a clone. Do you not feel that there are potentially
millions of wealthy customers who would pay vast sums of money to
avail themselves of this wonderful technology?”

Cavendish again stamped the
ground once with his staff to show that he had finished speaking
for the moment. He sat down and arranged his magenta coloured robe
around him, hiding his exquisitely tailored Armani suit.

Marcus stood up and, just as
Cavendish had done, rapped the floor three times with his golden
staff.

“Councillor Cavendish. I am
perfectly aware of the revenue that could be gained from such a
venture. However, my concern is that if we open this technology to
a wider public audience we lose control of it. A competitor could
not only take our business away from us but, by reverse
engineering, could use the technology against us, perhaps creating
an army of clones.”

The thud of Marcus’s staff
hitting the stone floor of the boardroom ended the Pindar’s
response.

Three more strikes on the
floor, and Councillor Bruce began to speak.

“My Lord Pindar, I
understand your concern, but what if we limited the benefits of
Clone Transfer to Recarns, such as ourselves. Surely the security
risk would not exist then? Even if we limited access to the
technology to registered members of our illustrious organisation,
we could make millions – for the Organisation, of
course.”

There was scarcely a gap
between the single strike of Councillor Bruce’s staff and the three
strikes of Marcus’s.

“Councillor Bruce. Whilst I
understand your point of view, I cannot agree with it. You are
thinking only from a financial point of view, you are not thinking
of the good of the Organisation.”

Councillor Bruce stood up
again.

“But my Lord
Pindar…”

He was cut off in
mid-sentence by the roar of his Pindar.

“PROTOCOL, COUNCILLOR BRUCE!
PROTOCOL!”

Councillor Bruce looked
sheepish and apologised. Marcus continued.

“The striking of staffs is
not only a sign of respect to the rest of the chamber, but also
serves to avoid interruptions, and vitriolic arguments. It is a
centuries old tradition. Members of the Council of Thirteen would
do well to remember that. You may speak now, Councillor
Bruce.”

The single thud of Marcus’s
staff signaled that the floor was open to another speaker.
Councillor Bruce struck the floor three times with his staff,
slowly and deliberately.

“My apologies, my Lord
Pindar. Please forgive me. No disrespect was intended.”

Marcus nodded his acceptance
of the apology. Councillor Bruce continued.

“We, the thirteen families,
have invested much money in the research and execution of the
projects that have led to your illustrious self now inhabiting the
body of a fully formed, fully functional clone. We feel that we
merit a return on our investment. Surely my Lord Pindar can see
that this isn’t only fair and just, but also the honourable path to
take?”

Councillor Bruce’s emerald
coloured staff struck the floor to close his question.

Marcus stood up, hammering
his staff on the floor four times, in doing so informing that his
next words should be considered a veto.

“Investments made in the
aforementioned projects were made for the good of the organisation,
not for the good of the individual. Such investments – and I,
myself, was a substantial investor – should be considered willing
payment for the lifestyle that we, in this room, all share. I
expect no reimbursement of monies donated and therefore neither
should you. So, let the records show that I invoke my power of
veto. You are all dismissed from this session.”

The thirteen Councillors
shuffled out of the room, but Marcus knew that those members of the
Council who had shown concerns would not let the situation rest. He
knew that they had invested a great deal of money in the Research
and Development of Soul to Clone Transference. They did deserve
more. But he was unwilling to accede to their demands. He privately
acknowledged to himself these councillors were correct, that he was
the only person to have benefitted from the new technology, but he
was damned if he was going to relinquish control of its use. Yes,
he would allow the creation of new clones but they would be chosen
by him, based on loyalty and usefulness. He didn’t need the respect
or agreement of these fools. He could do without them. He beckoned
over his personal assistant

“I want to know the location
of everybody who was in this meeting, for the next forty-eight
hours. At any time, day or night, I want to know where they are and
what they’re doing.”

,

New technology is generally
perceived to be an example of progress. As years and decades go by
computers have more processing power and are smaller. Televisions
left cumbersome cathode-ray tubes and valves behind around seventy
years ago, having passed through the development of flat-screen LED
and Plasma models, on the way to the 360° 3D Overhead Projection
models that became de rigueur in the 2050s, allowing the action to
appear more like a theatre experience in one’s own home. Travelling
by car was now a much safer process, thanks to self-drive cars and
their 99.9% inability to crash.

But sometimes new technology
just will not do the job properly. Pulse gun technology had taken
the personal weapon market by storm due to its flexibility of being
able to stun instead of killing its target. Even a head shot wasn’t
normally fatal, there being only a very small area on the surface
of a human head where the stun setting could result in a fatality.
A shooter had to be either very unlucky or an excellent marksman to
kill anybody with a pulse gun set to stun.

However, the new technology
had its limitations and the loss of power over a long distance was
one of them. It was almost impossible for a sniper to kill someone
from a long distance using a pulse-gun; the strength of the
electrical charge decreased exponentially as the distance increased
and a kill shot could easily become a stun shot. Weapons scientists
were working on a method of turbo-charging the pulse but had had no
success to date.

At home, sitting on a wicker
chair in his conservatory, Councillor Bruce was just about to relax
with a cup of camomile tea. It had been a stressful day and it had
taken all his reserves of courage to confront Marcus Carver that
morning. He wasn’t normally so forthright but he and his principle
allies, Councillors Cavendish, Romanov, and Krupp, felt aggrieved
that their opinion was being dismissed so off-handedly. He nibbled
the rich tea finger biscuit that accompanied his evening cup of
tea, and turned to his wife, Emma, to remark how a good cup of
camomile tea always made him feel better after a bad
day.

Old technology burst through
the window of the living room of his luxury apartment as two high
caliber armour-piercing sniper’s bullets tore into Councillor
Bruce’s skull. He had felt as safe as it were possible to feel
safe, thanks to the bullet-resistant glass that had been installed
in all the windows of the apartment but he hadn’t reckoned on his
killer firing five high velocity shots in rapid succession. In the
open air, with no protection, the sniper would have needed only the
one shot to kill his target but this gunman was armed with a
sniper’s rifle modified to fire five bullets rapidly into exactly
the same spot as the first had landed; the first bullet acting as a
marker for the subsequent bullets to follow, each bullet weakening
the protective structure of the glass until it gave way and allowed
the final bullet or two to continue on their trajectory until
hitting the real target.

Similarly, Councillors
Cavendish, Romanov, and Krupp knew nothing of their deaths. The
cull was clinical and perfectly executed.

Cavendish had found it a
little strange that he was the only customer at the golf driving
range; it was normally quite busy on Tuesday nights. However, he
ignored his initial misgivings, deciding that only the direst
emergency could ever drag him away from an activity – no, a ritual
- that he considered sacred. Even a confrontation with the Pindar
didn’t come under that heading. Marcus was only ‘acting’ Pindar
anyway. Nathan would soon be back (in whatever guise he now
existed) and things could get back to normal. He looked at the
target in the distance, altering his stance a little to give his
body more balance. He flexed his legs to gain the perfect striking
position, drawing his golf club behind him in preparation for the
perfect drive. He had a good feeling about this one. The club swung
in a beautiful arc and struck the golf ball cleanly, the impact
setting off the high explosive that had been packed inside it. The
Councillor was ripped apart, body parts littering the area around
the tee.

Romanov and Krupp hadn’t
spoken up at the meeting, but were just as incensed at Marcus’s
attitude as Bruce and Cavendish. They could not afford to have
invested so much money into the two projects without receiving a
healthy return. What did Marcus think he was doing? The Illuminati
wasn’t supposed to be somebody’s personal plaything. It had been
run for hundreds of years for the benefit all the thirteen
families. This is how it should always be run. Sitting on the deck
of Romanov’s luxury yacht, they considered what should be their
next step.

A slight humming in the
distance caught their attention. They looked up and saw what
appeared to be a small plane, flying at very high altitude. They
were not unduly concerned. Drones were in common usage as delivery
vehicles for many things bought online, or to monitor traffic,
although Krupp did think it a little unusual to see one working
after 6 p.m. He looked up again and saw a flash of blue light
emanate from the drone.

His last words were ‘what
the fuck’ as a missile plunged into the engine room of the boat,
leaving only splinters of wood and plastic bobbing up and down on
the surface of the water.

There was no need for these
deaths to appear to be accidents. The whole point of the exercise
wasn’t only to rid Marcus of dissidents on the Council of thirteen
but to also send a message to anyone else who might be thinking of
opposing him. He was not to be trifled with. Retribution would be
swift and decisive.